In this video we will be having a closer look at GaN FETs in order to find out whether they will improve power electronics products in the future. For that I got myself a commercial GaN power adapter which I will compare with a more traditional power adapter concerning their efficiency. Afterwards I will measure the resistance and switching speed of a proper GaN FET and finally use it in a buck converter circuit to demonstrate the difference to a normal MOSFET. Let’s get started!
Electronics
How to measure your Pulse with Arduino (Code Included)
What is a Pulse Sensor?
The heart rate sensor measures your heart rate in Beats per Minute using an optical LED light source and an LED light sensor.
Pulse Sensor Code and Library : https://github.com/rolan37/Pulse-Sens…
Cast Spells on Devices with This Magic IoT Wand
Sam March can now “magically” control smart outlets with a wand that detects gestures and sends them via Bluetooth.
As stated best by the writer Arthur C. Clarke, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Internet-connected homes can certainly feel like magic sometimes, as every appliance, light bulb, and outlet can all talk to each other and relay information for increased convenience and efficiency. However, just saying a command to your favorite digital assistant or pressing a few buttons on an app isn’t that fun, which is why Sam March decided to invent a novel way of activating smart outlets — through a magic wand. By performing certain gestures, the user can cast “spells” on specific outlets through Bluetooth.
Boochow’s RaspberryPi Pico Receives and Decodes MIDI Signals via Its USB Port
Developed using the TinyUSB library, this project receives MIDI messages via USB and decodes them for printing via UART.
Pseudonymous developer “boochow” has used the popular Raspberry Pi Pico in the heart of a MIDI device with a difference: Rather than making music, it’s designed to monitor and display the MIDI signals received from a USB MIDI device.
Building a better battery analyzer with Arduino
Your favorite device has just run out of juice, so you quickly take off the cover and reach into that old stash of alkaline batteries you have lying around. After trying countless combinations, you still cannot be sure they’re working properly, as each one has been slightly used. If only there were a way to know.
How a Split-Flap Display Works
Take a look inside my see-through split-flap display, made from laser-cut clear acrylic and an Arduino.
The mechanical design, electrical details, and firmware are all open-source, including comprehensive purchasing and assembly instructions: https://github.com/scottbez1/splitflap
3D Printed Cycloidal Actuator
I have designed yet another cycloidal drive! This one is different, though. Unlike most of my projects, it is strictly 3D printed. No CNC required. The cycloidal mechanism is also “inside-out”. The cycloidal discs do not rotate, they only wobble, transmitting rotation to the output. This was also designed to maybe be used in a modular robot arm. It’s also a 25:1 gear reduction.
DJ Harrigan Blends Reality with Fiction by Creating an Animatronic, Alexa-Powered GLaDOS
Inspired by the antagonist from Valve’s Portal series, Harrigan has combined a custom-built animatronic and an Echo to create GLaDOS.
Maker DJ Harrigan has blended two worlds with the creation of a voice assistant which combines Amazon’s popular Alexa with Portal’s fictitious but reasonably murderous artificial intelligence GLaDOS.
For the past seven months, Harrigan has been working to bring GLaDOS, the iconic artificially-intelligent testing-hungry antagonist from Valve’s Portal franchise, out of the game world and into the real. Initially, the plan was relatively simple: “I’m building a scaled animatronic version of GLaDOS (as she looks in Portal 2),” Harrigan explained at the project’s launch.
Arduino based Artificial Horizon using BN0055 gyro and Waveshare OLED.
An experiment to try to drive an OLED display with an Arduino UNI with data from a BNO055 gyroscope.
Code provided for educational purposes only, the code and devices are not appropriate for actual aircraft use for a wide variety of reasons.
Code available freely at : https://github.com/peterashwoodsmith/…
Serial Debugger With Display
Sometimes you need to quickly check the state of the device and having to use a computer for that can be a bit bothersome. A pocket-sized debugger that can monitor and display the data stream is the perfect solution for that!
On the upper right corner, there’s a pin header (RX, TX, GND) meant to be connected to the device you want to receive data from. The current iteration is only 5V tolerant, in the future we plan to add a switch to shift between the 5V and 3.3V logic levels.
We’ve used an ILI93441 2.2″ TFT display and an ATmega328P microcontroller (the design is based on the Arduino Nano schematic) for reading and displaying the serial data. We’ve also added a rotary encoder with push button, which can be used to switch between different baud rates, scroll through the text or pause/resume autoscrolling.
